Career Kickstarter - Tech

Ready to accelerate your engineering career in just five days?

At Optiver, engineers build the systems powering millions of trades a day across the globe: from core low-latency platforms, machine learning research pipelines, to real-time execution workflows. The challenges are complex, the impact is immediate, and the learning never stops.

Career Kickstarter: Tech is a five-day, all-expenses-paid program designed for students eager to explore the engineering challenges of building mission-critical trading systems that keep global markets moving. Hosted at our Amsterdam headquarters, you’ll work through hands-on coding sessions, system design workshops and a collaborative engineering project that mirrors the work of our engineers. You’ll also get an introduction to the trading concepts that matter from an engineering perspective, so no prior knowledge of trading or financial markets is required.

Top performers will be considered for a direct offer to join Optiver as a Graduate Software Engineer.

• When: 10-14 May, 2027

• Where: Optiver’s Amsterdam Headquarters

• Application deadline: February 7, 2027 at 17:00 CET

A week of building, learning and engineering at scale. Throughout the program, our full-time Education Team will be there to mentor you, offering guidance and feedback designed to accelerate your development.

• Hands-on engineering: Work on a real engineering project that challenges you to design, build and iterate as part of a real engineering team.

• Technical exploration: Join lectures and panel sessions with senior engineers to explore potential career paths and understand how real systems are designed, built and improved.

• Systems thinking: Take part in system design workshops to learn how high-performance systems are architected, optimised and scaled.

• AI-amplified development: Use the same AI tools, platforms and workflows as our engineering teams to navigate real codebases and datasets, test ideas and move faster - while applying your own judgment and owning the outcome.

• Pathway to a career: Demonstrate your potential during the program, and you may be considered for a direct offer to join Optiver as a Graduate Software Engineer.

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